This invention relates generally to the destruction of unexploded ordnance, and more specifically, to the destruction of land and sea mines.
The elimination of unexploded ordnance (e.g. mines) from land, beaches, or sea water presents a serious problem for both military personnel and civilians. Serious humanitarian overtones exist and many methods and techniques have been devised to deal with this problem.
Detection is the first step, which is typically handled by a variety of sophisticated techniques. Once the mines are located, however, the demining activity begins and presents serious dangers. Several methods are used to actually demine an area, including: (1) using rakes, plows, or rollers to actually detonate the mines; (2) detonating explosives on top of the mine (either on the dirt above the mine or on the exposed mine itself) to cause the detonation of the mine (usually the explosives are placed on top of the mine by a boom operated remotely or by a robot); or (3) exposing the mine (i.e. by removing dirt, in the case of a land mine) and placing a flare device on top of the mine. In the case of using the flare device, the flare device causes heating from outside of the mine which eventually causes the mine""s destruction through detonation or burning.
Demining in the above-described conventional ways involves open detonation of explosives (in addition to the mine itself) which introduces hazards to people, personal property, and land. These collateral risks are undesirable for obvious reasons, including the destruction of land which the military may wish to use for transport. This is especially true when the military is demining a road as it travels toward on objective. An additional problem seen with conventional mine destruction techniques, particularly on land, involves the introduction of additional metallic debris from the mine and/or the detonation device which subsequently interferes with additional mine detection, creating false positive readings of additional mines when metal detectors sweep an area.
Several, more recent, attempts have been made which utilize the use of an inert high velocity projectile which impacts the mine causing its detonation. These efforts have generally failed because of the very high velocities necessary to cause initiation of the mine. This is especially true when the mine is comprised of trinitrotoluene (TNT), which typically requires impact velocities above 3,500 feet/second. It is especially difficult to achieve these high velocities when the projectile must travel through water or dirt in order to reach the mine.
Other, related, technologies have included an attempt at introducing reactive materials or oxidizers to the TNT charge in an effort to cause its explosion. Typically, however, without enough oxygen (in the case of the delivery of reactive materials) or without a source of ignition (in the case of delivery of an oxidizer), the TNT was not effectively or regularly destroyed.
Thus, it is an object of the present invention to provide an effective mine-destroying projectile that fully neutralizes a mine without introducing additional metal debris into the mined area. Another object of the present invention is to provide a projectile which is capable of penetrating water or dirt with enough residual velocity to still penetrate the mine shell or skin and cause its neutralization through fast deflagration. Yet another object of the present invention is to provide a delivery system for the projectile that does not introduce metal debris into the mined area.
The present invention is a projectile for the destruction of unexploded ordnance comprising a dart containing a reactive composition. The reactive composition comprises a reactive element or metal selected from titanium, aluminum, magnesium, lithium, boron, beryllium, zirconium, thorium, uranium, hafnium, alloys thereof, hydrides thereof, and combinations thereof, and an oxidizer selected from lithium perchlorate, lithium chlorate, magnesium perchlorate, magnesium chlorate, ammonium perchlorate, ammonium chlorate, potassium perchlorate, potassium chlorate, and combinations thereof wherein the oxidizer is always present in a stoichiometric excess with respect to the reactive element or metal. Optionally included in the reactive composition is a binder. The most preferred metal is titanium and the most preferred oxidizer is potassium perchlorate (KClO4).
It is to be understood that both the foregoing general description and the following detailed description are exemplary, but are not restrictive, of the invention.